I never thought I was particularly good looking. But when I see old photographs, I realise that I was. I do wish I had known that at the time because beauty is power. I didn't realise how lucky I was to be young, beautiful and in Hollywood. It didn't...
Everyone talks about how we're on our phones all the time, but the fact remains that when I'm away on a film set for two months, I can Skype my family. I remember the phone calls my parents had to make when my dad was away for a while when I was youn...
Inspiration comes from so many sources. Music, other fiction, the non-fiction I read, TV shows, films, news reports, people I know, stories I hear, misheard words or lyrics, dreams... Motivation? The memory of the rush I get from a really good writin...
I wanted to become a director before I wanted to become a writer. When I was 10, people would ask me what I wanted to be when I grew up, and I said, 'Walt Disney.' I wanted to make films. But I wasn't offered a camera. I was offered language. So I st...
Personally I am very pessimistic. But when, for instance, one of my staff has a baby you can't help but bless them for a good future. Because I can't tell that child, 'Oh, you shouldn't have come into this life.' And yet I know the world is heading i...
It's like that Simpsons joke - they're filming a cow in a movie and they go, 'OK, we'll tape a bunch of cats together to make a cow', and it's like, 'Why don't you just use a cow?'. For some reason that is novel - like, 'Oh, my guitar sounds like a p...
There’s a chasm between writing about yourself and writing about your personal life. A lot of young writers want to turn their lives into stories, into films, books, because they feel their lives are somehow significant. But really, it’s not thei...
Contrary to popular belief, the past was not more eventful than the present. If seems so it is because when you look backward things that happened years apart are telescoped together, and because very few of your memories come to you genuinely virgin...
I don't think I've ever seen him in a movie theater! I've only seen him on TV. Wow, that's so silly of me! We only saw one of his films together, it was with a group of people, and when he kissed Deborah Kerr, I jumped off the couch and I ran up and ...
Ninety-nine per cent of traditional English literature concerns people who never have to worry about money at all. We always seem to be watching or reading about emotional crises among folk who live in a world of great fortune both in matters of luck...
[223 leaves the store] He Zhiwu, Cop 223: Somehow everything comes with an expiry date. Swordfish expires. Meat sauce expires. Even cling-film expires. Is there anything in the world which doesn't? [223 gives a can of pineapple to a passing street pe...
[about halfway through the film; Nicky has just calmed Ginger down after Lester was beat up by her husband's thugs] Nicky Santoro: [about her drinking] And take it easy with this shit, will you? I mean, this can only make matters worse. You're a beau...
Wikus Van De Merwe: Oh! I haven't shown you a picture of my wife! Here she is, my angel. I tell people she actually looks like an angel, you see here? The white looks like a halo on her head. Can you see that? She's my angel, you're picking that up o...
Dr. Anne Eastman: Hey, Do you have a particular interest in our paitient's X-Rays? Dr. Richard Kimble: What do you mean? Dr. Anne Eastman: I saw you looking at that boy's chest film. Dr. Richard Kimble: It's a hobby of mine. Dr. Anne Eastman: It's a ...
Frederick: You missed a very dull TV show on Auschwitz. More gruesome film clips, and more puzzled intellectuals declaring their mystification over the systematic murder of millions. The reason they can never answer the question "How could it possibl...
I write back to every fan who writes me, which is kind of a full-time job in some regards 'cause I don't want people to wait too long . So I get up very early in the morning and try to rip through all of them. I pretty much sleep four hours a night. ...
[to Charlie] Robert McKee: I'll tell you a secret. The last act makes a film. Wow them in the end, and you got a hit. You can have flaws, problems, but wow them in the end, and you've got a hit. Find an ending, but don't cheat, and don't you dare bri...
Peppy Miller: [trying to pressure the studio into letting her do a film with George] I won't work anymore. It's either him or me. [Zimmer appears bemused] Peppy Miller: What I mean is, it's him AND me! Or it's neither of us! [everybody is still looki...
As a performer, you can't just sit around waiting for the phone to ring. You have to write and develop projects for yourself, because casting people aren't always going to see you the way you want to be seen. Write a one-person show, shoot a short fi...
A significant number of people believe tribal people still live and dress as they did 300 years ago. During my tenure as principal chief of the Cherokee Nation, national news agencies requesting interviews sometimes asked if they could film a tribal ...
Man, do you ever feel it's just the hope of things we live for?' I asked. 'I mean, it's like the things themselves are just a big disappointment, you know? We like the searching, the dreaming. It's sort oflike the way previews for a movie are better ...
